A Different Sort of Life

It does not take a great deal of memory to feed my soul.
A journey to the place I was meant to be,
not even the highlights or tourist spots.
The back alleys and small streets are enough
to bring it all back. The place. The feel of it all.
One short journey and it lives in me.
Every. Single. Day.

It does not take a great deal of memory to flame my heart.
A certain kiss. A caress that most might have long forgotten
is enough to change my vision for the whole of my life,
seared in my skin, even far from my love,
a haunting of skin and soul that no one sees.

This is the world I live in. A thing of living, and yes,
selective memories so powerful
that even a drip of them each day sustains me
against the poison of the world. Gives me strength
and more than strength, hope

for something fresh that will live
long after I do not.

About this poem

I do not spend a lot of time in the past. Mine has been a checkerboard, and while I can call much of it up, for the most part, it lives in drawers and compartments in my head, neatly filed against the day they might be needed.

But Venice, and the woman I love, live in a different place. Not so much called up at will as simply felt, every day, whether they are physically there in the moment or not. I remember places, or even a single kiss in such a palpable way that it is as if I am there, not years away. Not a thing to be filed or hung on a wall, but coloring everything else, every day, year after year. It’s probably not quite normal.

And yet here I am. About to go to Venice again after more than a decade. A chance, maybe the last chance, to feed my days again and get through the next chapters of my life, somehow living in a place my soul was made for while not able to live there at all.

So, a poem about that. And a poem about the lives we find ourselves in as opposed to the lives that might have been. A poem to remind myself that every moment matters. Poetry is never about one thing.

The photograph was taken, as you probably expect, in Venice.

Be well. Travel wisely,

Tom

PS: The photograph was taken in Venice. I remember the day, the temperature, the smell of lunch cooking in a nearby trattoria, all of it. Nothing special, just a sense of being aligned with who I really was.